Same Old Different
by Belicia Zarita
Summary: Johnny "Nitro" Morrison has always been a different breed of demon hunter than the other Academy graduates. However, when he gets rescued BY demons, then his whole world REALLY starts to get out of whack. This work heavily influenced by Catherine :D
1. Prologue

Matt ran through the underbrush, panting and gasping for breath, leaping over a row of shrubs. He could hear the sounds and yells of people behind him, the screams of their clan as they were set upon, but he tried not to focus on that, focusing on keeping his grip on the hand clutched tightly in his own.

"Come on, Father! Come on!" he gasped out, glancing back at his father, Michael, who was clutching onto his son's hand and carrying his wife, his very pregnant wife, Dawn Marie, in his arms. Dawn Marie was gritting her teeth, crying out once in a while, and Michael whispered soothingly to her, his thinning and graying blonde hair tangled and wild around his shoulders, trying to keep her calm as they ran, though Matt could sense their panic...it would have been impossible not to.

"Over there!" Matt grunted when he was suddenly pulled instead, his father breaking out in front of him, and Matt saw they were running for a large church. He nodded somewhat, then released Micheal's hand, running ahead and putting his arm in front of him to shield his face as he plowed into the large, locked doors full bore, knocking them open and falling to his face as he did. He rolled quickly out of the way, letting his parents enter, then rushed to push the doors closed again, panting slightly as he managed to close them before the mob could catch up.

Micheal carried Dawn Marie a few steps inside before he went to his knees, laying her carefully on the floor, wincing at another cry of pain from her. "Matthew, find something for her head, please..."

Matt nodded and turned, looking around the church a few times, then running up to the altar, stopping and crossing himself once before rushing to the pulpit, pulling a thick cushion from the chair and hurrying back to them, holding it out. Michael took the cushion and lifted Dawn Marie's head slightly, resting her against it and taking her hand. "All right, Dawn Marie...come on...it's going to be all right..."

"Michael...Michael, we have to get out of here...those people will find us..." Dawn Marie gasped out, shuddering once.

"Shhh, shh, no, don't worry about them, we're safe now. They won't expect us to have hidden in a church. Focus on the baby. We have to get the baby first, then we'll get somewhere safe." He stroked her hair back some, then looked up at Matt. "Hold her hand, Matthew, stay with her."

Matt nodded, crouching and taking hold of his mother's hand as Michael got to his feet and hurried over to a large steel basin, easily hoisting it up and carrying it over. He murmured a vaguely Latin chant as he set it near, and Matt heard the hiss of steam as the holy water inside began to boil and steam, then abruptly stopped, as though it had cooled just as fast.

"It's all right, Mother..." Matt whispered, reaching down to cup her face with the hand not holding her's. "Everything will be all right."

"Matthew...I'm so sorry about this...we should never-,"

"Don't worry, Mother," Matt said with a faint smile. "Father is right, it's going to be okay."

Michael crouched down between Dawn Marie's legs, wincing slightly. "All right, Dawn Marie. Come on, you know what you have to do. We have to get this baby born. Come on, honey, push...push, the baby's ready, Dawn Marie, push!"

Matt winced as his mother squeezed his hand roughly, crying out as she bore down hard, but he bit his lip and snapped the sound off quickly. He stroked back her hair with the other hand, whispering softly to her as she grunted and strained again. "It's all right, Mother...it's all right..."

"Michael, it's so hard...it's so...AHHHH HARD!" Dawn Marie shrieked, arching her back.

"I know darling, but push! You have to push, you have to work, come on...come on, Dawn Marie, you're going to have to push hard...ready? Ready honey?" Michael watched as Dawn Marie nodded frantically. "Okay...okay...now!"

Dawn Marie gasped and screamed again, crushing Matt's hand once more, then fell back against the cushion a moment, grunting and raising her head as she tried again.

"That's it, honey, that's it! I can see...come on, Dawn Marie, push again...push again, the baby's coming, the baby's coming!"

"Come on, Mother..." Matt murmured softly. "You can do it, I know you can..."

Dawn Marie whimpered some, but gritted her teeth, starting to push again, and with the sudden effort, there was a dramatic transformation in her appearance. Shiny, brown, leather-like wings, the same color as her hair, suddenly sprang from her back, and a matching but smaller set rose from the top of her head, at the same time a set of cat-like brown ears formed in front of them. Michael brushed aside the brown furry tail that appeared from the base of his wife's spine, setting it aside so she wasn't laying on it awkwardly.

"Come on, honey, this is it! One more, Dawn Marie, one more!"

Dawn Marie screamed shrilly, but there was suddenly another cry, a higher-pitched, more angry one, and Matt smiled down at his mother at the sound, still stroking back her hair. She pushed once more, then fell back with a weak groan as Michael scooted back slightly, a similar smile crossing his face as he held a squalling infant in his hands, the baby's fists clenched tightly as the howls of displeasure became louder.

"It's a boy, Dawn Marie. He's been born a little boy," Michael said, smiling and standing quickly, stepping closer to the basin of water and lifting the lid, using it to scoop out lukewarm water and clean the blood from the baby, including from his already formed navel, and the blonde, feathered wings and furry tail and ears.

"A boy..." Dawn Marie panted softly, smiling weakly as the baby's squalls became even more indignant at the washing than they had been at being born. She looked over at Matt. "A little brother for you..."

"A little brother," Matt agreed, chuckling some.

Michael finished cleaning the baby, then turned, pulling off his own shirt and wrapping it carefully around the baby, smiling down at him as he moved and crouched next to Matt, helping Dawn Marie to sit up and bracing her against his chest, putting the baby into her arms. Matt moved to her other side, looking down at the baby as he started to settle down, blinking milky blue eyes at them, still scowling and wriggling.

"Jeffrey..." Dawn Marie murmured, smiling. "Little Jeffrey...our new baby..."

The baby blinked at them and yawned, the sound halfway between that of a baby and a kitten mewling, then closed his eyes, almost burrowing against his mother. She rocked him in her arms, murmuring softly, and slowly, the bizarre traits from both of them faded away, leaving them looking perfectly human. She then closed her own eyes, letting out an exhausted sigh, laying more heavily against her husband.

"I never thought I'd have a little brother or sister..." Matt said softly, reaching out to touch the makeshift swaddling. "It's...it's different."

Michael smiled, putting one hand on his older son's shoulder. "Matthew, you have no idea how different this will make things become..."

Matt chuckled a moment, looking back down at Jeffrey, then gasped when there was a sudden loud pounding against the door.

"Inside!" a voice bellowed. "The demons have made their way inside our sacred place!"

"How did they find us??" Matt gasped, getting to his feet quickly. "How do they know, they can't think we came into a church!"

Michael stared at the door, then blinked as he sniffed, eyes widening. "Must be dozens of them...all around us..."

"What do we do, Father?" Matt asked, staring down at them. "We'll have to climb to the tower and try to escape from there, we'll never outrun them otherwise!"

"No..." Michael said softly, looking down at his wife, who was staring blearily at the door, holding the baby tighter to her chest. "No, we can't outrun them."

"Matthew..." Dawn Marie said softly, looking up at him, and he crouched next to her.

"Mother?" Dawn Marie lifted Jeff away from herself, against Matt's chest, and he blinked as he held the baby tightly. "Mother?"

"Matthew," Michael said, reaching out to touch his shoulder again, the grip harder than it had been before. "Matthew, do what you said. Climb to the bell tower with Jeffrey and escape with him from there. You'll have to move quickly."

"What about you?" Matt asked, eyes darting back and forth between them. "Aren't you coming?"

"Matthew...your mother can't run in her condition. Birthing and transforming a newborn is a very difficult and draining process for the mother. She won't be able to get out...and we can't carry her and a newborn to safety with this many humans after us."

"What are you gonna do??"

Michael put his arms under his wife, lifting her into his arms and carrying her towards one of the pews, setting her down in it and bringing the cushion along, putting it underneath her head to make her more comfortable. "I'm going to defend my wife. I won't leave her here."

"But...but Father, you can't fight them all off on your own..."

"And neither can the two of us," Michael responded, standing and looking at his eldest child. "Our entire clan was no match for this group. They will kill us all. That's why you have to take Jeffrey and escape while you still can."

"Father, I can't-!"

"You will," Michael snarled, but his gaze softened quickly. He let out a sigh, reaching out to take Jeff from Matt, holding him for a minute, staring down at the confused gaze, then lifting him closer, kissing the baby gently on the forehead, then cupping the back of Matt's head and kissing his as well. "Matthew, you two may be the last of our kind. You can't let them finish us off. You have to take your brother and get him to safety, somewhere that they can't find him."

"Father..." Matt chewed his lip, wrapping his arms around the larger man, feeling the baby squirming between them as the two men embraced a moment. Michael then pulled away and guided Matt over to Dawn Marie, who was smiling reassuringly at them.

"Don't worry, Matthew..." she whispered, raising one hand, as Matt crouched next to her. "Don't be afraid. You know what to do, you can do it. You can make sure our race survives. But you have to hurry, son, you have to." Another pounding at the door underlined her point.

"Mother..." Matt whimpered, not even trying to hide tears as he buried his face against her neck, feeling her put an arm around him and kiss his temple lightly. He sat back as Michael lifted her, and she took Jeff in her arms once more, kissing him as well.

"You two are the future. You're our children and we will always love you." Dawn Marie sniffled, blinking back her own tears, then turned and handed Jeff back to Matt. "Go. Go quickly, Matthew. If they're distracted, they might not even see you escape."

He hesitated only an instant, but as she said again, "Go!" Matt turned away, sobbing softly as he bolted for the altar, rushing up it and into a nearby doorway, clutching his baby brother against his chest. He stopped one last time in the door, staring back at his parents, who were sitting together in the pew, arm in arm, watching them, and Matt sniffed again, trying to keep his vision from blurring, then turned again, rushing into the dark stairwell, sprinting up the stairs. He reached the door at the top, stopping to open it carefully, not wanting to jar Jeff, and gasped when there was an unmistakable sound behind him in the church-two loud gunshots.

"Mother...Father..." he whispered, turning to look back down the stairway. He heard angry shouts and voices, men rushing about the church, and he stared a second more, then looked down at the baby wrapped in his arms before kicking the door open hard, racing out into the tower of the church, the open air and the giant bell of the steeple greeting him straight away. He made his way gingerly around the large bell, heart pounding in his chest so hard that he thought the instrument might begin gonging from the vibrations. He looked down at Jeff again as he reached the railing around the deck, chewing his lip at the sight of the baby still staring up at him, seemingly more confused than anything else.

"I heard something!" a voice behind him called, and Matt gasped, whipping around to stare at the open door, hearing thudding steps rushing up the stairs. Without another hesitation, he turned to the rail, getting a running start and leaping over it, squeezing Jeff against him so hard that the baby let out a shriek of displeasure, and in an instant he was airborne, weightless-and as quickly as he was, his shirt tore and shredded apart as four enormous leathery black wings-two larger ones with smaller wings splitting off underneath at the same base-sprung out from his back, spreading on the air and causing him to swoop up away from the ground, moving out over the trees, Matt beating them furiously to gain some altitude.

_**BANG!**_

Matt screamed at a sudden sharp pain that burst through his right wings, and he faltered badly in the air for a moment, almost falling straight into the trees, and he glanced back to see a man with long, curly brown hair and wearing a long black trenchcoat aiming at him again. He heard more shots being fired, more guns, and winced as he made a quick decision, abruptly curling into a ball, wrapping his wings around himself, keeping Jeff shielded between his chest and legs as he fell out of the sky, down towards the treetops, crying out as branches whipped and smashed against him, cracking and breaking under his weight. He gritted his teeth, and just before he hit the ground, he managed to unfold himself from his fetal position, hitting the ground hard on his back, hard enough that his teeth cracked, but keeping Jeff safely and firmly tucked against his chest, bearing the full brunt on himself.

Matt lay there a second, eyes squeezed shut, trying to force back the intense agony, but the shrill cries of his new brother forced him to get up, to sit up and get to his knees, rocking the infant, shushing him. He blinked when he noticed his father's shirt, still wrapped around the baby, was stained red, but realized just as fast that the blood was his...his wing was gushing and he was scratched and cut all over from the fall through the forest canopy. He stood slowly, groaning at the jolts of pain through his entire body as he did, but kept rocking the baby, trying to calm him.

He grunted when he realized he probably hadn't fallen all that far away from the church, and glanced back through the woods, almost expecting to see the mob upon him. Matt moaned a little, then turned and started running, folding his wings as best he could against his back, keeping them from snagging on anything as he rushed away, desperate to escape before the humans could catch up and finish the two of them as they had already done to the rest of his family.


	2. Finding Fido

Johnny Morrison made his way through the woods, trying his best to ignore the heavy rainfall that was pouring down on him. In all honesty, he didn't really care too much about the rain, even though the long trenchcoat he was wearing weighed twice as much now that it was soaked, his simple white T-shirt and jeans were plastered to his skin, and his boots were squelching in the mud. He paused only once to shift the weight of the heavy backpack he was carrying, eyes on the ground, just walking, hiking along the path with his gaze firmly on the small compass in his hand, following the direction as closely as he could. It was getting a little more difficult though. Dusk was falling and with the storm, it was going to be very hard to keep his direction.

He whistled once, looking up and around, stopping in his tracks briefly. "Here boy!" he called out. "Where'd you get to?" He glanced around again, whistling once more, frowning a bit at the rain dripping down his face, then turned and kept walking.

There was a rustle in the brush behind him, and Johnny stopped, turning around to look towards the noise. "That you, boy? Decided to come around after all? Don't keep me waiting!"

The rustles continued a moment longer, but then a few birds flew out, chirping and screeching at the rain, and Johnny made a face, turning to keep walking-

Just ahead of him, there was a snarl and a roar, and he stopped, dropping the compass to his side, at the sound of crashing and something heavy running. He took a couple of steps backwards away from it, eyes wide, and the sounds shifted and came straight towards him. Within only a second, the source became visible.

"Well hi there, Fido," Johnny said, smirking and relaxing a little as the wolf burst through the brush and stopped just out of them, facing him down. "I was wondering where you got off to."

It was a dark color, fur deep grey, nearly black, with glowing yellow eyes. It was twice the size of any ordinary wolf, though, probably weighing about 170 pounds, and it's fur didn't quite hide the heavy musculature of the body. It was snarling and snapping it's jaws, foam and spittle flying from the mouth, paws filthy with mud and another stain that was a familiar rusty red shade.

"Done had a nice meal tonight, huh?" Johnny taunted, shrugging his backpack into place again. "Guess you want to make a try for dessert?"

The wolf let out a very un-wolfish sound, almost like the roar of a grizzly instead, or some other kind of woodland beast, and it's haunches bunched and sprung, propelling it forward, front paws spreading out ahead, claws-talons, more like-showing even through the muck and matted hair, fangs catching a quick and unexplainable gleam off some unidentifiable bit of light-

Johnny stepped back and in one smooth motion, drew a glittering silver machete from under his coat, ducking down into a lunge of his own and sweeping the blade over his head. He felt a give of gristle and bone, heard the wolf's roar go from ungodly ferocity to a shrieking cacophony of pain, and despite the rain already falling on him, he was aware of a heavier, thicker liquid that was suddenly pouring down over him. He jumped forward at the same time, feeling the tugging on his blade suddenly cease as the restriction to it was gone, and he was forward, landing back on the ground and spinning himself around, landing in a crouch with one hand supporting his balance on the ground and the other still holding the blade at the ready as he looked back.

The wolf had collided hard with the ground, and he could see that his aim had been true...it was cut, deep, from the chest and all the way down it's middle. It was still screaming, legs twitching and kicking frantically, as it's guts spilled loose and the mud beneath it gained that same rust-red shade, but Johnny knew that it wouldn't be managing much more, and got back to his feet, holding the stained machete out to one side, letting the rain wash it clean as much as possible.

"Sorry, Fido, business is what business is," he said, as the wolf continued to convulse, the sounds toning to a raspy gurgling, it's tongue hanging out and flopping loosely, matching the guts and organs strewn across the forest floor. Johnny made a face at a sudden realization of feeling, and reached up, picking loose a chunk of some unidentifiable bit from his hair, tossing it to the rest of the pile.

As he watched the wolf, the glow in it's eyes faded, the yellow giving way to a far more human brown. It wasn't the only change...the dark fur in some places began to fall out in clumps, as though the wolf's body were somehow rejecting it, and in other places retracted and vanished as though being reclaimed. There was a sickening popping noise as the limbs warped and shifted about, the canine features retracting into elbows and knees. The ribs appeared to be changing as well-he could see them through the rended flesh-and Johnny tilted his head, watching in silent fascination as the organs...the ones still in the right place, anyway...shifted through colors and shapes themselves.

The head was going through the most obvious change. The large snout was flattening and spreading, the dark nose lightening, all the skin going to a rich caramel-like color. The fur here didn't all fade, but some of it warped around the face...a beard appearing, with lips entrenched and a nose remaining forth over the top. And the eyes, those brown eyes, glanced toward him-one last accusing glance of searing rage-before even the metaphorical light was out of them, and the former wolf was now simply a dark-skinned human man, laying on the ground naked and with most of his entrails left in a line behind him, stopping just shy of Johnny's feet.

Johnny checked his machete, then crouched to wipe it off on the loose leaves and pine needles along this stretch of the ground. This area of New England was unusually populated with pine, for some reason, and it annoyed him slightly that there wasn't some grass for cleaning off the blood, but he figured as long as he let the rain do some of the work too, this blade would be okay to skip a better cleaning until he could get somewhere else. He opened his jacket and resheathed the weapon in it's holder, tucked carefully into a belt and turned so it hid easily behind his back in the trenchcoat. He then walked over and picked up his compass, checking the direction once, then heading back the way he had come.

He wasn't particularly keen on staying out in the dark too long. He wasn't worried precisely, as the biggest threat was behind him and considerably neutralized. But there were always surprises to be found and the sooner he could get back to his car, the better.

Johnny hadn't been out to hunt the werewolf. It was more of an incidental as he had been driving through this part of the country on his way to scout a demon down south. He'd glimpsed the big bastard racing across the road and recognized him immediately, and Johnny wasn't one to ever turn down a shot at ridding the world of a few more werewolves. So he'd pulled ahead a ways and parked, pulling on his backpack and doing his very best to look like a hiker, and had wandered the woods nearly an hour. When that didn't work, he had finally taken to calling out insults to it, and that had brought it in almost immediately.

Weres were unbelievably predictable sometimes.

Johnny winced as it was finally getting too dark to see, stopping just long enough to shrug off his backpack and put it on the ground. He squatted, opening it up and starting to rummage inside for a flashlight, annoyed that there wasn't one in it's usual pocket inside. He dug past the other various items inside-a pistol, a few crosses, some white cloths, and finally closed his hands on the metal, pulling it out and feeling around a moment before pushing the button to turn it on-

-all he had time to see was a glitter of teeth before a heavy weight barrelled into him, knocking him backwards and sending the flashlight spinning out of his hands. Johnny grunted, managing to get his feet up into the weight and throw it backwards, then popping back up to his feet and rolling forward, grabbing the flashlight and spinning around, pointing it in the direction of the throw.

It was another werewolf...slightly smaller than the other, it's fur a light brown instead of gray, but with those same glowing yellow eyes and foaming mouth. This one wasn't carefully lining up a pounce, though. It was already coming back at him.

"FUCK!" Johnny yelped, managing to jump out of the way just before the were could get him again, staggering a bit and putting his back to the tree, reaching back and quickly jamming the flashlight into a branch so that it mostly illuminated the tiny area they were in now. The wolf was already spinning around, coming back towards him, and he went for his machete again, gritting his teeth. "Fuck fuck fuck fuck FUCK!"

He could see as the wolf turned and reared up at him that this one was female...almost certainly the mate of the first. Stupid mistake to assume the first was alone...amateurish. He winced, but it was too late to beat himself up for it now, wrenching the dirty blade out of the holder, realizing as soon as he did that he'd just made another potential mistake and swearing at himself for it.

The smell of her mate's blood suddenly filled the air, and the were howled in renewed rage as she started for him again, but this one wasn't jumping forward for the kill like the first had done. She was smaller and faster, less reliant on brute power; so she was keeping low, coming in for his legs, trying to bring him down before she went for her kill. Johnny had to jump forward and over her before she could take him off at the knees. The tree behind him was gouged by the swiping claws, leaving a row of marks behind in the bark. Johnny hit the ground on his feet, slipping a bit in the mud, but managed to turn and swing as the wolf whipped around and leapt for him again.

It was a second too late for them both. Even as the machete hit the wolf's neck and sliced deeply into it, he felt a fireball of pain explode from his left side, and screamed as her claws ripped through his side, leaving an identical set of claw marks as were left behind in the tree. Still, Johnny managed to rip his blade free and kick the wounded were away, staggering back and falling to the ground, his free hand going over his side, holding the injury as the wolf fell back as well, gasping and yelping in pain. Her eyes turned back to him, and he gritted his teeth when he saw that his aim hadn't been quite good enough. Her neck was cut, and it was bleeding...probably would be fatal...but not before she had enough time to get back and finish him off. Johnny moved to try and get to his feet, trying to push the pain out of his mind, but the wolf was too fast, lunging in and knocking the machete out of his hands, straddling over him and roaring down at him. He lashed up, grabbing hold of her ears and yanking them backwards, keeping her snapping jaws away from his face, and he kicked at her as best he could, yelling in pain as he did.

The wolf roared into his face, and she clawed at his front, mostly only getting his jacket but some of it was into his flesh, and Johnny screamed and continued kicking, trying to knock her away, to do what he could just to get her away, and abruptly jammed one hand into her neck wound, gouging deeply into it, clawing back as though he himself were an animal, trying to reach further through. The wolf shrieked in pain but kept coming for him, clawing and biting, but as he ripped, there was a sudden spurt of blood, and the yellow glow in her eyes flickered, leaving behind disturbingly human green eyes. He kicked once more, sending the wolf backwards and onto the ground, shuddering once, then going limp as the ripped jugular finished what the neck wound had started, bleeding her out in a matter of seconds.

Johnny groaned, falling back against the ground, dimly aware of the feeling of mud and water all around him and the pop-crunch sound of the wolf shifting back to her human form as she died. He reached down, probing at the wound in his side slightly. He couldn't feel anything but muscle...no bone, no internals. It hurt like hell, was deep, had potential to get nasty, but if he could make his way back to his feet and get back to his car, he could probably ride it out there. Just had to get out of the elements. He started to sit up, grunting in pain, holding the injury, blinking back unwilling tears that welled up in his eyes, looking down at his chest. It looked like an enormous housecat had been at him, but they were marks that probably wouldn't even need butterfly bandages. The wound in his side was the worst.

Johnny slowly managed to pull himself to his feet, ignoring the shape of a young woman with long brown hair laying on the forest floor, and went over to pick up his machete, not even really bothering to wipe it before tucking it away. He started towards the flashlight, but as he reached up to get it from the tree, he staggered, grabbing at his side and doubling over, grunting loudly and panting a little. Darkness briefly welled up in his eyes and he thought for a moment that the light was going, but realized fast that he was about to faint.

"No, no, no no no..." he snarled through gritted teeth, putting a hand on the tree to brace himself. The pain was bad...hot and spreading across his body out of control...but he commanded himself that it wasn't bad enough to warrant unconsciousness. His brain protested that assumption, but he refused to acknowledge it, grinding his teeth together hard. After a moment, the dizziness and blackness passed, and Johnny straightened as much as he could...which wasn't nearly as much as he wanted to...and retrieved the flashlight, returning to where his backpack still lay from where he'd been digging through it earlier. He reached down for it, picking it up, trying to pull it on but figuring out quickly that it wasn't going to happen. His left arm was not completely cooperating with what he was telling it to do, either from some kind of muscle injury or just because his body was turning traitor on him over his refusal to acknowledge the condition it was in. Everything was feeling heavier. His wet coat was like an iron suit weighing him down at this point, trying to pull him back into the mud.

Grudgingly, Johnny mentally admitted that maybe he was in a bit of trouble.

Still, he was alone out here. If he allowed his body to do what it wanted, then this wound _would_ be fatal. At the very least, he had to make it back to the road, where eventually someone would be along to find him and take him to his car where he could fix himself up. Johnny turned back in the direction he'd come, staggering along, dragging the pack as best he could with his right arm and trying to hold the flashlight in his left.

He'd have to hide the weapons though...he might slide by posing as a college student who needed a ride if he could hide his wounds, but no one was going to pick up a strange man carrying a bloody machete, no matter how innocent he might otherwise look.

Johnny walked...stumbled, anyway...for a while, alternately cursing himself for his carelessness and his body for wanting to curl up and quit on him. Stupid mistakes had gotten him here, cockiness and bad assumptions. If his father or his teachers from the academy could see him, they'd probably kick him in the wound and then force him to keep walking anyway. He knew he wanted to do it to himself.

At least there was no danger of his becoming a were himself. The modifications done to him back then had given him protection from paranormal infections like that...the sorts of things that were basically STDs of the demonic variety. If that had been the case he'd have already fallen on his machete to be sure it wasn't going to come to be.

Johnny blinked when he stepped through and his light shone on what looked like the back of a large shack. It was painted light blue, apparently fairly fresh, but he couldn't seen any house nearby or any indication that it had any business here. He came closer, walking around it and finding a door at the front, painted bright red, with a single window on the side. He looked in, blinking at the sight of a twin mattress laying on the ground, a pile of books next to it, a box of crayons nearby and the brown walls scribbled all over. Apparently this was some child's playhouse.

Johnny looked up at the sky, wincing at the rain, then back inside at the mattress.

It'd do for now.

He pushed open the door, dropping the backpack and the machete, groaning slightly at the dizziness that swirled up again. _Okay_...he thought as he fell to his knees, then collapsed onto the mattress. _I just wait here till morning and then I go back to my car. I can do that. I can just...do...that..._

Johnny groaned a little when he realized that he couldn't avoid it this time...he was going to pass out. He had just enough time to curse his weakness and stupidity one more time before he was out.


	3. Bizarre Meeting

Johnny groaned softly. He didn't open his eyes just yet, they felt hot and grainy and he wanted to just roll over and go back to sleep. When he shifted, however, he gasped aloud and grabbed at his wounded side, remembering all too quickly why moving wasn't the best idea just yet.

"It looks like he's waking up..." a soft voice somewhere over him said, and he grunted, eyes shooting open as he reflexively sat up and backed away, scrambling against the wall, ignoring the sharp agony that accompanied the movement in favor of determining a need for immediate self-preservation.

There were two men standing there, staring at him. They looked roughly the same age, mid-to-late-twenties, he figured, about six feet tall...maybe in their thirties, actually...and vaguely alike, as though related...then again, their ages seemed harder to pinpoint. The stockier one was darker in both appearance and apparent disposition, with a thin beard along his jawline, his curly black hair pulled back in a severe ponytail and frowning slightly. The skinnier one had green eyes and loose blonde hair cut to just above his shoulders, clean-shaven and looking more nervous than anything.

"Calm down, mister," the bigger one said, holding up his hands in a calming manner, as the blonde stepped back slightly, looking on with large eyes. "We're not gonna hurt you. You look like you're in some major kind of trouble though...we can help if you just calm down."

After just a second of seeing them, Johnny found himself already re-writing his notion that they were the same age. Even though he still couldn't make up his mind exactly how old either one was, the dark one had a sense about him of more worldly experience, and the blonde's face was clean and unlined, innocent. It couldn't have been more than a few years, but there was definitely an age difference.

There was something bizarre about them, though. Johnny figured it out just as fast as he'd figured out everything else, though...this shed was in the middle of the woods, and they weren't dressed as though they were out deer-hunting or even hiking...or even as though they were more than minimally acknowledging the cool weather. The older one was wearing battered jeans and a black workshirt, with a pair of worn black boots, and the younger was in a yellow sweater that was bright enough to almost make him wince, denim overalls, and red-and-white sneakers. Their wildly different styles of dress seemed to widen the age gap even further.

Even though all his observations had been done in a matter of seconds, the pause was enough to apparently concern the older one, who moved hesitantly closer, still holding out his hands. "We don't want any trouble, mister. If you need help, we can get you somewhere..."

Johnny winced as he held the wound, registering a heat in it through his fingers. Beginning stages of infection, most likely, and he allowed himself another mental curse at his own stupidity. "I...I have a car on the road...just need..." he winced at the effort it seemed to take to form words. "If I can just get to it..."

"Mister, it's raining pretty hard...and there's not any roads close by here," the dark one said. "How far did you come?"

Johnny frowned, trying to remember, but the entire incident was pretty fuzzy. Actually, his whole head was pretty fuzzy. Still, he knew he'd need to offer some kind of cover story...especially when he realized the bloody machete was laying right there. The younger one especially was alternately staring at him and casting wary glances to the weapon. "I...I was hiking the woods..." he murmured, lowering his gaze. "I...think it was a cougar or...I don't know what they have here, it was dark and...I..." He glanced back up, waiting to see what reaction that fib would get.

The two men exchanged glances, the younger one hugging himself slightly, obviously nervous, and finally the older looked back at Johnny. "At least we can get you to our house. It's too cold out here and your clothes are torn up and soaked...probably not helping."

Johnny let out a sigh of relief, both that they had bought the story and that he'd just acquired a way out of this mess. "Thank you...just need enough time to get my feet under me..." Johnny started to try and rise up, but yelped when there was a sharp jab of pain through his side that seemed to go through his entire body, and he slid back down and onto the mattress, gasping softly as his vision momentarily darkened, and he fought it back just as he had before passing out, not wanting to risk unconscious again.

"Whoa, whoa, easy there. Come on..." The dark one moved closer, putting an arm around Johnny's shoulders, moving to try and get him to his feet. "Can you walk at all?"

"Yeah...yeah, I think so..." Johnny grunted, hanging onto the guy as he was pulled gingerly to his feet. "At least a little bit..."

"Well...maybe you better let me carry you, anyway. It looks like that cougar or whatever messed you up pretty bad. You should rest as much as you can."

"I'm..." Johnny started to protest, but grunted when the guy abruptly swept him up into his arms, cradling him, and apparently with no visible effort. The fellow must have been strong, he didn't even shift slightly in his step as he picked up Johnny, who was no featherweight, he knew. Still, he protested, a little embarrassed at the gesture. "You don't have to do this, I'm sure I can walk just fine..."

"It's a walk in the woods back to our house, the terrain's not really that easy. Just let me handle it, and you rest." He glanced back at the younger man, nodding slightly. "Grab his bag, we'll bring it along with us."

Johnny grunted, trying to sit up once more, wincing worriedly both at the notion of these two finding the contents of the bag and the idea that either one might accidently hurt themselves. "That's...you don't...I..."

"Don't worry. Jeff'll be real careful with your stuff, right, Jeff?"

"Right, Matt..." the blonde responded, in the same soft voice that he'd heard when he first came to.

Johnny watched as the younger man-Jeff, it seemed-carefully picked up the bag, holding it out to one side slightly, and he let out a sigh and fell back into the older one's-Matt's-arms, giving in and letting the guy carry him through the bright red door and outside. It was raining again, harder than even last night, and Johnny groaned a little at the pattering of cold wet coming down on his face. Amazingly, though, even though the guy carrying him was moving at a pretty fast clip, at least a jog, there wasn't much jarring around from it. Johnny was still in pain and still woozy, but normally getting carried with a large injury of the type he was nursing was nearly as bad as having to walk on it yourself.

The treetops cleared, and Johnny glanced over to see a small clearing, in which there was a modest little two-story house. It was a plain brown, as though the wood it was built of had never been painted, or that it was designed to look like a log cabin, he wasn't sure, and the roof was flat, making it more or less a large cube on the ground. Definitely strange-looking, but still more inviting-looking than the tiny children's shed.

Matt headed up to the door, waiting on Jeff to scoot ahead and grab the handle, pulling it open for him, and Matt managed to make his way in without banging into the door frame, carrying Johnny through a quaint and sparsely decorated kitchen and into a living area, gingerly setting him down on a plush tan sofa. "Don't wanna mess up your stuff..." Johnny rasped out, grunting and holding his side.

"Don't worry about it, couch can be replaced." Matt knelt next to him, reaching out to grip his coat and open it, wincing at the sight. "Damn. This is bad. Jeff, run upstairs and get the kit, okay?"

Johnny heard the slightly metallic thump of his bag being set down, and running sounds as though someone were going by and up a flight of stairs, moving around overhead. "Just...need to wait out the rain, then...can get to my car and patch this all up..."

"No offense, buddy, but I don't think you can make it anywhere in your shape right now. Bleeding's stopped but this needs stitches or something like that."

"Bring me a sewing...sewing kit, I can...done it before..." Johnny gritted his teeth, trying to move a hand under himself to sit up, and cried out when that useless movement just exacerbated the pain. He fell back against the couch, squeezing his eyes closed and cursing under his breath.

"Now it's bleeding again."

"Yeah...yeah...okay...just..." Johnny groaned a little, hearing the slight thuds as Jeff returned from upstairs, coming over, still looking at him with obvious fear, and also seeming to slowly get darker, as though he were changing right before Johnny's eyes...

No, wait. He wasn't getting darker. Everything was.

"Buddy...hey, buddy, don't...hey!" Matt leaned into his line of sight, tapping his cheeks lightly. "Come on, stay with me, man, don't do that. You don't wanna do that!"

Johnny didn't want to do that, of course not. But he'd been struggling with it for half a day now. Blood loss and shock were cruel mistresses and when they decided it was time to go down, wasn't much to be done about it, apparently. Johnny didn't like the idea, but he accepted it. With any luck, he wasn't about to die on the couch of a pair of strangers' home, maybe just a day or two of delirium, before-

Matt was still over him, still talking, looking steadily more worried and frantic, but his voice seemed to be coming from the end of a tunnel, getting faint and sort of weird and echo-ey. It was actually a little trippy, or at least what he imagined people meant when they described something as trippy. Everything had auras, sort of shadows following them as they moved. Matt had a few other Matts following him around, and Jeff's abnormally bright yellow sweater seemed to be taking on an intensity as bright as the sun, as though it were going to take out the entire vision. Already it had somehow gotten into Matt's eyes, turning them yellow and catlike as he leaned down, gritting his teeth, showing sharp little fangs, not like a vampire's yet distinctly not human, and there seemed to be a good kind of cooling that was coming from his touch now-

Wait, wait. That wasn't right. He was quickly getting more sure of it. The yellow sweater wasn't doing anything. Matt's eyes had turned yellow, with slitted feline irises. His teeth were definitely fangs, and he was doing something now, some kind of strange ability.

Johnny let out a shriek, finding strength he didn't realize he was capable of at the moment, kicking against the side of the couch and away from Matt's touch, jamming against the other arm of the sofa and drawing his knees up, staring towards Matt, panting. As he watched, the color in Matt's eyes winked clear, then was back to the usual human brown in an instant, and he scooted back, reaching out with one hand to touch Jeff's arm, guiding him back and to relative safety.

"Calm down, buddy," Matt said, holding up his hands. "We're not going to hurt you. We just want to help."

"What are you?" Johnny asked, holding his ribs, blinking a little when he realized the pain was nowhere near as bad. Either his adrenaline rush was making it better, or whatever Matt had done had actually helped.

"We just want to help..." Matt said, holding up his hands. "I can tell you aren't what you seem, and I promise I don't care about it if you're harmless, I just want to make sure you're okay, all right?"

They were some kind of demons. That explained a lot right there. At the very least, Matt was. Johnny winced, shaking his head some. "Stay away from me. Don't...don't come near me!" He glanced around for his machete, cursing his foolishness for-what, the fourth time now?-and seeing it was over by the door, carelessly dropped to the floor...he must have lost his grip on it.

Matt stepped back some, studying him, glancing back at Jeff, who met his eyes for a second, then Matt looked back. "We're friendly, okay? We aren't going to hurt you. If we were going to hurt you, I wouldn't have tried to heal your injuries. I'm just trying to help you get better. I don't know what you're doing here or whatever, I don't care as long as you aren't going to hurt us..."

Johnny glanced back and forth between them a moment, licking his lips once, considering. "I know your names are Matt and Jeff."

Matt glanced back again, then back to Johnny, seeming a little baffled. "Ohhhh...kay. Yeah, that's our names. Does...that matter?"

Johnny let out a breath, falling back against the arm of the couch in exhaustion and relief. "Yeah...it does, but...it's all right if you don't care." Demons that were nasty had a thing about their names being known by their prey...identity inflicted power. If these two didn't react...and for that matter since they rescued him at all...the odds were good that they were actually friendly.

Not that it mattered either way since the shape he was in, there was no way he could fight off two of...whatever they were.

Matt crept closer again, reaching out to touch Johnny's wound again. "I can heal this the rest of the way...I'm taught well in spells...if you want..."

Johnny nodded slowly. "If you don't mind...please..."

"It's no problem." Matt crouched down again, looking down, and his eyes shifted again. Johnny watched, now with fascination instead of delirium or horror, as they went from a perfectly ordinary brown to a catlike yellow, and the coolness came to his hand again. Johnny noted now that it did bring away the pain, sapping it out slowly, and he was aware of a slightly more intense itching and knitting feeling of healing. And even though there were definitely fangs in the stranger's mouth, he didn't seem to be planning to use them.

After a minute, Matt sat back, wincing a little and looking down at Johnny, reaching down to pull up his shredded shirt. "Those are all better, and your side is closed up, but you'll still need a little time to recover."

"I can do that from my car..." Johnny said softly. "Just gotta get back to it and...yeah..."

"You're not up for that yet," Matt replied. "If you were on the highway, it's a good four, five miles off, and it's already pouring again. Probably gonna be ice soon."

Johnny frowned a little, but in the silence, he was aware of the slight pattering of precipitation on the roof. He groaned a little, starting to try and sit up anyway. "My car, though...I...need my car, can't just leave it...been alone too long already..."

Matt frowned, then stood. "I can go get your car if it's that important. I can make that distance a lot faster than you."

Johnny looked up at him, silent, considering. On the one hand, he would be trusting the demon he'd just met to drive his single most precious possession. On the other, he'd be leaving his single most precious possession abandoned on the side of the road in a potential ice storm where it stood the risk of getting hit, towed or worse.

It was really not even worth considering.

Johnny laid back with a grunt, sighing. "The keys are in a side pocket on my pack...be real careful getting them out. I have...stuff in there that I don't want hurting you..."

"Okay..." Matt went over and opened the pocket, gingerly reaching in and taking out the small keyring, making a face at it. "Silver?"

"That's not a problem, is it?"

"No, not for us. Just answered a few questions, is all." Matt turned back to him. "Which way did you come from?"

"Um...I was...following in...coming towards the west...maybe a tad south..."

"So east and a little north. Okay, I'll be back in about half an hour, then." Matt walked over to a fireplace, over which Johnny suddenly noticed what appeared to be a pair of broadswords of a gleaming silver, and then turned to Jeff, who had spent this entire time standing back away from the two of them, watching in silence, eyes still wide and vaguely alarmed. "If I'm not back in an hour, cover him with a blanket, get the other sword, and come looking, okay? Meantime, get some of that tomato soup and heat it up, he'll need something."

"Matt, don't leave me alone..." Jeff murmured, scooting closer, almost leaning into him.

Matt spoke in a low voice, but Johnny was still able to make out his words. "Don't worry...even if he goes hostile, just keep him away from his pack and go for brute force. You can handle him. But meanwhile, just fix him something to eat and keep him safe. I'll be back in a few minutes." He leaned in, touching noses with the other man just for a brief second, then turned away, heading out the door, closing and locking it behind him as he went.

Johnny watched as Jeff stood, looking out an adjacent window for a bit, then he slowly turned, regarding Johnny with the same worried, mistrustful look he'd been giving him since they'd first met. The two studied each other in silence a moment, Johnny sitting up against the arm of the couch with a grunt, and Jeff just standing and staring. Finally, Jeff spoke up.

"I'm going to make some soup now."

He turned and vanished into the kitchen quickly before Johnny could say anything else. Johnny laid back again, letting out a breath and closing his eyes. This was a decidely weird situation he'd gotten himself into. It could always get worse, though. At least his father wasn't here to see it.


	4. Clues

Johnny winced a little from where he was laying on the sofa. The younger fellow, Jeff, had hurried into the kitchen, out of sight, about five minutes ago, and Johnny could hear him shuffling around, clanging things together, a faint sizzling sound once in a while. He had said he was going to make soup and thus it wasn't rocket science to assume he was making soup. And since the older one, Matt, was going to be out getting the car back, Johnny had a few minutes of relative aloneness to contemplate what was happening.

His first order of business would be trying to determine exactly what the two of them were. If their default form wasn't human, then they were expert shapeshifters. Still, he'd never met a friendly shapeshifter. They tended to be higher level demons, rather nasty and typically out for a new skin, so to speak. Yet, he had seen Matt's eyes change. That was an indication that, at the very least, they could make themselves look slightly different. So, shapeshifters.

Then again, every bit of supernatural behavior he'd seen had come from Matt. Jeff hadn't done much of anything yet, staying quiet and out of the way while Matt was giving the orders. He was still following Matt's instructions now even though the dark-haired man had gone and wouldn't be back for a while. It implied an order to their status, one being dominant and one submissive. There were several kinds of demons that paired off in such ways, either by family groups or by breeding pairs. He wouldn't guess two males were a breeding pair-a heavy racking of his brain assured him that he knew of no demons that were single-gendered and yet paired off to breed-but it wasn't an absolutely sure bet. Still, the odds were that they were familial in some way, with Matt as the dominant elder.

What else...yes, the strength. He'd noticed it when Matt was carrying him back, with no obvious effort or strain at all. He'd been able to maintain a brisk stride and not cause Johnny any more pain from the carrying. And from what he'd said to Jeff as he left, telling the younger man to try and overpower Johnny if he went hostile, he was aware that they were stronger than Johnny was.

Not to mention that it was frigid outside. Cold enough for there to be ice instead of rain. He'd been wearing a heavy coat and still shivered. They were dressed for coolness, yes, but neither of them had been really prepared for the weather and didn't seem all that concerned, either. He couldn't think of a single demon, at least not that would survive anywhere but the poles of the earth, that was tolerant of cold but not heat. So they were in all likelihood simply immune to extremes in temperature.

Plus healing ability. Johnny reached down to probe his side and again easily feel the difference from the gaping hole earlier and the knitted wound that remained. A great many demons were able to heal, it was just that most chose not to use this ability on anyone but themselves. It wasn't much of a clue on it's own, but with the other attributes, it helped narrow the playing field.

Along with all that, there was no aversion to silver, in fact, they seemed to prefer having it. This being heavy werewolf territory, that wasn't a bad idea, actually. Weres were notoriously intolerant of other demon types in their territory. Another notch.

Last but not least, the house. It was strangely designed, almost amateurishly. The cube shape was as though someone had simply thrown together the sheer basics in order to get a roof over their head. Obviously there was some knowledge to it, as there was electricity and the structure seemed quite sound, but there was a distinct lack of...flair, for lack of a better term. A house for the sake of a house, not much more. The plush couch, from what he could see, was the most extravagant bit of furniture inside, and the swords over the fireplace were the only thing that could be called decorations. This was a place built of necessity, not of wanting for the warmth of a home.

While all those traits certainly narrowed down the list, Johnny couldn't quite place them to any type of demons that he knew of, either. There was a chance that they were some kind of halflings, as interbreeding was possible with a large number of creatures, including humans. He'd just have to see if anything else appeared that finished the connection.

He sensed rather than saw Jeff re-entering the room, and glanced over at the young man, who was holding a tray with a bowl of tomato soup, a plate with some kind of dark bread, and a glass of water. He looked nervous, but he eased his way over, holding the tray at arm's length as though expecting some kind of attack. "I...this is finished..."

Johnny nodded a little, wincing as he pushed himself into a seated position. "Thank you," he said, nodding, reaching out to take the tray as Jeff held it out. As soon as he had a grip on it, Jeff immediately backed away, hovering near the door to the kitchen again, staring at him. Johnny lowered his gaze to the tray, picking up the silver spoon and starting to eat slowly, realizing as the first bit passed his lips that he was famished. He hadn't eaten since before beginning to stalk the werewolf yesterday, and the healing probably had used up a lot of his body's own energy. Still, he tried not to make an ass of himself, just in case bad manners might be offensive to his host.

"Is it okay?" Jeff asked softly, pressing a little more against the doorframe to the kitchen.

"It's excellant, thank you," Johnny said between spoonfuls, picking up the bread and taking a bite, discovering that it was some kind of banana bread. An odd combination with the soup but not at all unwelcome. "Did you bake this?"

"M-me and Matt did...um, there's more if you want..."

"No, no, I don't want to eat all your food, you've done enough for me." He tried to smile reassuringly. The kid seemed scared enough as it was, best to try and keep him calm.

"It's okay...Matt and me don't really need to eat...just somethin' to pass time sometimes..."

Another little bit of puzzle snapped into place. They didn't need food. "If you don't need to eat, then what do you do for energy?"

"Um...we go into town, sometimes...go around people. Emotions, Matt says...I think we get food from that."

Johnny frowned a little. That tidbit definitely rang a hard bell, but he was sure that wasn't the answer. Still, since the kid seemed inclined to speak to him, he figured he might as well go for the direct approach. "What are you guys?"

Jeff chewed his lip, looking around almost frantically. "I...I, um...I don't know if I'm supposed to tell you...I...Matt just said..."

"Hey, hey, it's okay," Johnny said, holding up a hand to calm him down before he went off into a fit. "It's all right, I don't mean any harm. You two just saved me, I won't hurt you. But if you're more comfortable letting me talk to Matt, that's fine. I understand."

Jeff nodded quickly, obviously relieved, and turned his attention to the bag and machete on the floor, wincing. "I...I better clean that up..."

"I can do that..." Johnny, said, but Jeff shook his head.

"No, Matt told me to take care of you. And you're hurt. You should rest. I'll take care of this." Jeff went over, picking up the bag in one hand, carefully bringing it over and setting it next to the couch, then walked back, getting the stained machete and heading back into the kitchen with it.

Johnny finished his food, then set it aside, reaching down to get his bag and drag it around, opening it up to check on his things. He dug through it, mentally cataloguing as he did. His collection of crosses and other religious symbols was still neatly tucked into the inside pocket. The flashlight, still with a couple of drops of blood on it from the night before, still clicked on. A few steel vials of holy water and some small knives of various metals-gold, silver, brass, bronze, and iron-were still safely in their holsters. A box of lighters and a small can of lighter fluid were similarly in place. And in the middle was an opaque blue bottle with an ornate gold cap, a faint sparkle evident even through the dark glass. He nodded to himself, everything was where it was supposed to be. Johnny closed the bag and put it back in the spot Jeff had placed it, looking up as the young man came back into the living room, carrying the now-clean and still spotted with water machete.

"Does this look okay?" he asked, holding it out so that Johnny could grip the handle.

"It looks fine, thank you," Johnny said, taking it, with Jeff again quickly scooting out of reach just as his hand closed on it. Johnny lowered his head and tucked the machete through the straps of the backpack, keeping everything together. "You don't have to be scared of me, I really mean that."

"I just...I never seen anything like you before. You're a hunter, aren't you?"

Johnny looked up at him. "You know about hunters?"

Jeff nodded solemnly. "D-demon hunters. People who kill us. Matt's told me stories about...stuff like...what happens with hunters..."

"I'm not like those, I promise," Johnny said. "A lot of hunters kill indiscriminately, anything that's not 100% grade A human. But I'm different. I only go after the bad things. Stuff that preys on innocent people. You and Matt obviously aren't like that or else you wouldn't have brought me in to help me."

Jeff chewed his lip again, but looked up as there was a sound outside of an approaching engine, and he ran across the room to another door, opening it and looking out, then running outside. Johnny smiled some, recognizing the sound of his car's engine, while at the same time ticking another box of his mental checklist. Matt had gotten to the car and brought it back ridiculously quickly, and he knew it wasn't because of driving. Speed was another forte.

So, whatever they were, they were superstrong, superfast. They were potential shapeshifters, who were heavily tolerant of extreme temperatures, didn't need food and instead apparently gained energy from human emotions, and they were apparently unaffected by silver.

Thank God they were friendly or he wouldn't have had a chance even before being injured.

The door opened again, and Matt came in, shaking out his ponytail of a few drops of melted ice, while Jeff was behind him, brushing off his shirt. Matt walked over and held out the keys to Johnny. "Safe and sound now. Car'll get iced on but it won't do any damage. Parked away from any trees that could fall and everything."

"Thank you," Johnny said, voice showing that he was, in fact, quite deeply appreciative, as he took the keys and leaned down to put them back into his pack.

Matt nodded, then reached over and picked up the empty tray. "Good boy, Jeff," he said, turning and holding it out to the younger man. "Go on and clean this up and put it away, okay?" Jeff nodded and took the tray, disappearing back into the kitchen.

"I think I make him nervous," Johnny said, leaning against the arm of the couch, wincing as his side ached slightly from the movement.

"Well, he's never seen anyone like you. He's still young yet, hasn't been exposed to much."

"Oh? How old is he?" Johnny asked, keeping his voice noncommittal. Something like that, an idea of what was "young" to them, would be another clue.

"Just turned 32 this last summer," Matt said, nodding a little.

That wasn't as helpful as Johnny had expected. 32 was technically young even for humans. Well, nothing worse making another shot at it. "Well...I hope it won't offend you if I ask, but...Jeff knows what I am so I figure you do too..."

"A demon hunter, yeah. Wasn't that hard to figure out, what with the silver and the machete and the fact that you stink of dead werewolf." Matt looked back over at him.

"Right. Well, I already told Jeff and I'll tell you too, I'm not some mad killer of demons. I only go after the ones who are bad. I haven't got any beef with beings that just wanna live in peace and not hurt anybody."

"I can respect that. That's a little bit of what we do here. We've had to clear out a few wolves that were interested in taking our turf, too."

"Then...can I ask you, what you are, exactly? I've got a few ideas but I'm not sure."

Matt looked back at him, raising an eyebrow, seeming as though he were thinking it over. He looked down at the floor, an odd twitch to his face for a second, then he nodded and looked back over at Johnny.

"Okay. If you wanna know."

Johnny nodded. "Yeah, I wanna know. Just for professional curiosity's sake."

"We're incubuses. Or, probably how you folks would know us, cubi, for short."

Johnny blinked. "Cubi? But...cubi were wiped out...every piece of the Academy syllabus says the last cubi were slain in Germany over 30 years ago!"

"Well..." Matt looked over as Jeff stepped out of the kitchen, looking more frightened than before, if at all possible. "We weren't."

Johnny stared at the two of them, mouth open slightly. "Incubi. My God. You guys are some of the most powerful demons that exist!"

Matt waved a hand slightly. "Don't worry about it. Listen, Jeff and I need to go upstairs and talk a bit, will you be okay down here alone?"

Johnny nodded slowly, still staring, and Matt walked over, touching Jeff's arm, that apparently being all it took to get Jeff to follow him towards and up the stairs. Johnny heard them moving, settling into a spot somewhere off to the side, and falling silent.

Cubi. He knew what cubi were. His brain listed traits automatically. Magical creatures. Extremely long-lived...there had been records of some aged in the _thousands_ of years. Strong, fast, incredibly capable shapeshifters. And even though he hadn't seen any traits on them, he knew that all cubi had two sets of wings...on their backs, that allowed them to fly, and a set atop their heads, the use of which no one had ever quite determined...and the various cubi clans had other different traits that marked their appearances. Some had animal-like features, some had bizarre markings, but otherwise they were all remarkably the same.

Johnny laid back on the couch, contemplating. Cubi, an apparently extinct species usually only found in Europe, and yet here were two in New England. This would definitely warrant further investigation later. At the moment, though, finally having something in his belly reminded him that he was exhausted. A major discovery like this came only once in a lifetime, but for now, it could wait till after a long nap.


	5. Family Affair

There was a faint sort of tinkling in the air, the likes of which sounded completely out of place. So far as Johnny knew, he was on the road, on his way to his next hunt, driving his bright red Impala, his favorite blessed silver machete in the seat next to him, but for whatever reason, the radio was only playing this strange tinny sound that was like someone trying to play a rock song with a xylophone...

Johnny abruptly jerked awake from the dream to the realization that the sound was his cell phone, ringing in the back of his bag. He raised his head from the couch and reached over, grabbing his backpack and pulling it closer, digging around and locating the silver phone, pushing the button and putting it to his phone. "...'lo?" he croaked out, already missing the deep sleep he'd been enjoying.

"Johnny? Where are you? You're late."

"Oh God..." Johnny sat up slowly, snorting and wiping his face. "I hit a little snag..."

"A little snag? You've been in the same general region for the last two days."

Johnny blinked. "Have you been tracking my car?"

"Well, you were supposed to be meeting me here so we could go track down a damned Tulpa, and those things are so fucking wily that I wanted to be sure that nothing happened to you. And here you've been sitting still for much, much longer than you should, so..."

Johnny scoffed slightly. "For God's sakes, Dad. You know, I'm plenty old enough to be able to drive from New York to Boston on my own in my own car without a demon taking me over." He laid back on the couch, looking towards the stairs. "Something's come up a little more important right now, anyway. I got surprised by a pair of weres."

"How did you get surprised by weres?" Johnny could hear something in the background, like a horn and a man's voice shouting.

"Dad, are you driving?"

"Yes, I'm driving. I've got the transmitter working on your car and I'm coming to meet you."

Johnny bolted upright on the couch, eyes wide. "Where are you??"

"I'm about half a mile away, getting close. Turning onto some tiny little backroads here."

"NO! No, no no no no no no no no, Dad, no, stop, stop where you are right now, do not come any closer!"

"I knew it! I knew you were in some sort of trouble or else you would have made it to meet me! All right, if you're possessed, I'm going to just come right through the door spraying holy water so-,"

"I'm not in any trouble, but I'm with a couple of guys who will absolutely freak the fuck out if you just come barging in here!"

"What's going on?" a voice behind him asked, and Johnny looked back to see Matt standing at the base of the stairs, with Jeff standing behind him, eyes wide.

"Oh dear God, please don't get freaked out, it's my father, he's-,"

"Is he the one who's coming towards us with a very majorly freaked-out vibe attached to him, because he's-,"

"-are you??"

Johnny realized his father was shouting on the phone, and he quickly put it back to his ear. "Dad, look, when you get here, just stay in your car and I will come out and meet you, all right? Don't try to charge into the house." He switched off the phone and stood, looking at Matt. "It's my father. We were supposed to be meeting in Boston and because I was late, he came looking for me. I'll go out and deal with it."

"He'll hurt us if he realizes what we are," Matt said, cocking his head and scowling deeply.

"He's a very old-school hunter..." Johnny said, getting to his feet and moving to the door. "But I can get through to him, I promise, I won't let him do anything."

Matt narrowed his eyes, and in that instant, Jeff immediately turned and bolted back up the stairs, and Johnny heard a door slam. "If he tries anything, I will defend what's mine."

Johnny winced. "It'll all be good...it'll all be good..." he muttered to himself, going and opening the door, stepping outside, crossing his arms as he stepped out into the cold. There was a thin sheen of ice on most everything, but the precipitation had stopped for the time being. However, even with the hazard, he recognized his father's driving. He could hear the car...probably that same old blue Mustang...straining it's engine as he whipped it around the turns coming up the dirt road towards the house. He stepped down the steps and carefully made his way out as the car...it was the blue Mustang all right...pulled up next to his Impala and screeched gracelessly to a halt.

His father stepped out, already brandishing a gleaming silver pistol, and aimed it at Johnny. "Who am I?" he demanded.

Johnny sighed. "You're Scott Levy, my father, your hunter name is Raven, our code word is 'Graceland,' our secret phrase is 'Arm the marshmallow cannon,' Mom's been dead since I was two years old, and on my seventh birthday, you took me out on my first vampire hunt and made me put my back against the wall and shoot them with a supersoaker filled with holy water and then I cried for half an hour afterwards until you took me to get ice cream. Now throw the holy water you're going to throw at me before it freezes."

Raven shook his long, curly hair back, studying his son for a moment, then shrugged and tucked the gun into the holster. "I guess I don't need to throw the holy water."

"No, you don't. I told you, I have everything under control."

Raven looked towards the house Johnny had come out of, raising an eyebrow as he studied it, and Johnny could see him contemplating. "Who the hell are you staying with?"

"A couple of new friends. They're really nice, they've taken good care of me, and they know what I am and they won't kill me, and you don't need to try and kill them, and you couldn't anyway because they're cubi."

Raven blinked, then looked at Johnny. "They're what?"

"Cubi. Two of them. Incubuses. There's an older one named Matt and a younger one named Jeff. They rescued me after the weres tore me up, they healed me and fed me and they were letting me enjoy a nice nap on their couch before you called and woke me up. They're completely harmless."

Raven frowned. "Cubi are very, very far from harmless, Johnny. There's a very good reason such a concentrated effort was made to wipe them out."

"I know all the old history. I know about Mom. But these two didn't have to help me. They could've either kicked my bones all over the forest or at the least just left me to bleed to death, but they didn't. They went out of their way for me. So they're not mindless killing machines. Hell, Jeff is only 32 so he's barely out of toddlerhood so far as cubi go."

Raven crossed his arms. "I didn't raise you to be all lovey-huggy with demonkind."

"No, you didn't, you raised me to be an indiscriminate murderer when I've showed you about a hundred examples of demons who just wanted to live their lives in peace."

"The very vast majority of demons would rip your guts out as soon as look at you. They may put forth a brave face in public but how do you know what goes on behind closed doors?"

"Well, here I know what goes on behind closed doors. They heal wounds and they cook fucking tomato soup, Dad."

Raven frowned some. "Cubi. You were rescued by a pair of cubi."

"Yes! Hi, just said that. And by the way, it's fucking cold out here, so I'm about to go back inside. I don't want to take the car out in this weather and I'm still sore as shit. You can go look for the Tulpa on your own if you want. I'm gonna stay here." Johnny turned and started back towards the front door. "If you come in, you should leave your weapons in the car."

"Leave my weapons?"

"Dad, like you even have anything that would put a dent in an incubus for longer than a couple of seconds. Unless you're carrying heavy doses of silver nitrate, you would just piss them off. Just make it a show of good faith."

Raven frowned a bit, but Johnny just turned and went back into the house, shivering a bit. When he stepped in, Matt was standing there, very obviously on edge.

"He thinks there's something wrong with you," Matt said, looking out the window towards the new person in the yard.

"That's nothing new. He's thought that way since I joined the New Order," Johnny muttered, heading back for the couch and settling back on it, holding his sore side.

"New Order?"

"A group of hunters who don't kill every non-human thing that moves. It's probably generational. Dad's old school, I'm new school. Pretty typical for when a kid gets dragged into the family business."

Matt looked up towards the ceiling, then backed away from the door. "I'll go upstairs with Jeff. We'll stay there until your father leaves."

"You don't have to do that. He won't do anything, I promise."

"You believe that. He's still having very serious conflicts and a sense of mild infuriation and deep worry towards you."

Johnny was both amused and marveled slightly at the way the cubi communicated. He knew they were creatures of emotion...it was their food, their primary method of communication, their abilities with it bordered on telepathy. His studies had told him that cubi couldn't even lie...not from any real lack of ability, simply because in their society and culture, lying would have been impossible, so it wasn't even like it occured to them to do it. So between reading exactly from moment to moment what Raven was feeling and expressing his concerns about it to Johnny, Matt was giving Johnny a very fascinating peek into the inner workings of his father right now.

He thought of it as a justified peek, considering the guy actually went so far as to plant a fucking tracker on his car.

Matt stepped back, looking over to Johnny, looking a little more baffled than anything else. "He's starting to put his things back into the car and he doesn't even know why himself."

"Good. I told him to make a show of good faith and not bring any weapons into the house. I want him to meet you. I've been trying for a very long time to convince him that not all demons are bad and out to kill everyone, so meeting you would...you know..."

Matt studied him, and Johnny was aware that his emotions were being scanned as well, probably to check for his truthfulness. "You know what I'm doing and you're trying to help me out. Don't try to help me out. Just behave normally. It doesn't feel right when you try to...feel...harder."

Johnny laughed a little, then waved a hand slightly. "Sorry. I gotta be honest, this is all pretty new to me, too."

Matt's frown deepened again. "Jeff will stay upstairs. He's frightened enough of just you."

"That's okay. And don't worry, as soon as I've got Raven convinced that you aren't dangerous, I'll make him go, and then the instant the weather clears, I'll be out of your hair as well."

Matt walked into the kitchen, then came out, dragging a chair with him, putting it down and sitting, facing the door. He didn't say anything more, but Johnny accepted the silence as a tacit agreement. It was bizarre though, that while he was sitting there, leaning slightly forward, watching the door, Johnny had an image of a cat sitting on a windowsill and watching a bird, knowing it couldn't get to it and yet compelled to observe it, regardless, tail twitching in anticipation and frustration.

Johnny was no emotion reader, but he could tell as the door started to open that things were about to get more bizarre.


	6. Tension

Johnny watched in silence as Raven stepped through the door, catching eyes with Matt. He saw Raven suck in a quick breath, and his hand involuntarily went to his hip, where he would normally carry some sort of weapon, but he hesitated halfway, then somewhat sheepishly lowered his hand.

"Dad..." Johnny said, standing, holding up one hand. "This is Matt. He's the incubus I told you about."

"You said there were two," Raven said evenly.

"The other one is Jeff. He's upstairs, he's nervous about us. That's why we're going to be on our very best behavior, right?" Johnny glared at Raven to imply that his question was rhetorical.

"Yes, fine..." Raven said, coming over to the couch next to Johnny, hesitating another second before gingerly sitting down. Johnny rolled his eyes and sat down as well, with Matt simply watching them in contemplative silence the entire time.

"Matt, this is my father, Scott Levy. He prefers to go by his codename Raven."

Matt nodded slightly. "You don't like your given name because you feel conflicted towards your father and so you've more or less rejected it in favor of creating something new for yourself, including why you gave your son a completely different last name, and now you're getting offended and your level of concern is going up steadily because of me." Matt blinked once. "Sorry."

Raven stared at him, then cleared his throat a little. "Um. Yes. Indeed."

Johnny nodded, looking back and forth between the two, who just studied each other in complete quiet before Matt turned his gaze towards the ceiling over his head for a moment. He cleared his throat a little. "Matt and Jeff found me after a couple of weres got the drop on me, they brought me back here and Matt used some magic to heal the worst of my injuries." He lifted his shirt to show the mended wound. "This was gaping open just a few hours ago."

Raven looked down. "It's not a complete heal."

"Your son was already in a highly agitated state when he realized what I was doing. I didn't want him to feel any worse," Matt said, returning his gaze to them.

Raven nodded, studying Matt again. "You disguise well. No distinguishing marks, no abjectly obvious magical aura, good-looking without being movie-star perfect. You've studied."

Matt tilted his head a little. "This is simply how I look with my clan traits hidden."

Raven raised his eyebrows. "Really? Most of your kind alter their appearance greatly from what they look like in order to stay hidden better."

"My clan lived a peaceful existence in the forest of Germany," Matt replied. "We didn't venture near humankind, nor any others, save a few fairies we shared our forest with."

"Your accent isn't German, either."

"I adopted a new one once I came to America. Copied one from a southern gentleman in the port of the ship I traveled across on. My old accent seems to draw too much attention." Matt tiled his head, as though to contemplate Raven from a new angle. "You don't seem to carry roots for any sort of heritage. You wander. Your son wanders. Most hunters I've ever encountered carry this sense about them."

"It's to be expected. Most hunters are wanderers, not settling down in any one place, save maybe for long enough to start a family. Our business makes it difficult to stay in one place."

"Your business involves death."

"Only of bad things," Raven said, raising an eyebrow.

"I am not a bad thing. My brother isn't a bad thing and my family wasn't a bad thing. We kept to ourselves."

"Okay, whoa, whoa," Johnny said, scooting a little to put himself between their line of sight, holding up his hands. "You guys. I'm trying to foster understanding here. Dad, keep in mind, if these are the last two cubi in existence, they don't precisely have anything to gain from rampaging here. They're brothers, they can't breed."

"Cubi are by their nature androgynous," Raven said. "Shapeshifters able to go back and forth between the genders at will."

"Yeah, but they don't screw their _siblings_, Dad."

Raven growled and sat back on the sofa. "I don't like this, Johnny. There's nothing to trust about these kind."

Matt narrowed his eyes slightly, and oddly enough, the mild ice and rain falling outside seemed to noticeably grow heavier with that motion. "We've done nothing wrong."

"Not yet."

"Dad!" Johnny said, turning back to him. "This is exactly what I was talking about! You're...you're like a species racist or something! This guy brought your son, your _only_ son, the _only_ family you have left on this entire _planet_, in out of the cold and took care of me and fed me and healed my wounds and gave me a warm place to sleep and even went so far as to bring my car here for me, not to mention you're being rude to him and yet he's restrained himself from gutting you like a fish, and yet you're looking for an excuse to burn this place to the ground!"

"This is not how I raised you, Johnny, not to trust the same creatures who killed your mother."

"It's not like they personally did that, Dad! It was a succubus anyway, and you found her and split her in half anyway!"

Matt abruptly stood. "I'm going upstairs. Johnny, feel free to stay and rest. I'll be back when your father is gone." With that and a motion that brought the mental image to Johnny of a cat flicking it's tail, he went to the stairs and headed up them, walking around a bit upstairs before they heard a door open and close, then silence.

Johnny sighed, rubbing his temples. "You're being unreasonable."

"_You're_ being unreasonable."

"God, you're like a child sometimes!" Johnny said, throwing his hands up, standing and starting to pace.

"Johnny, I don't know how you got involved with the New Order, I thought I had done my best to keep you apart from those...people. I never understood how you could-,"

"Dad, it's not like humans good, demons bad! Humans can be bad! Jeffrey Dahmer was human. Ted Bundy was human, Susan Smith was human, Hitler was human."

"Now, technically, Hitler's great-grandfather is believed to have been some sort of pixie."

"Still! Humans do bad things, too!"

"Humans aren't our business, Johnny. The things that bump in the night that we try to keep hidden from the other humans so they can keep living their normal little lives without having to worry about getting their throat torn out in the night is our business."

Johnny sighed, sitting in the chair Matt had previously taken. "You know, Chris agrees with me."

Raven looked over at him. "Does he, now?"

"Well, face it, Dad. He's a demon, and you trust him."

"That's because he's been spelled to be trustworthy. If his bottle were broken, he'd probably try to kill us for our family keeping him enslaved for seven generations."

"Actually, I asked him about that. He says he likes being around me as an intellectual equal, but he called you a gelatinous prick." Johnny leaned over enough to reach his backpack, snagging a strap and pulling it closer.

"That sounds like the sort of language he would use." Raven watched silently as Johnny opened the bag and took out the blue and gold glass bottle, which seemed to sparkle even more as he touched it and lifted it up. "You aren't going to bring him out now, are you?"

"Why not? He might be able to shake some sense into you over this."

"Are you sure it won't set off your..._friend_ up there."

Johnny snorted. "I think he could sense if I were going to do something threatening. And he'd be able to kill you and I both in a heartbeat if he decided he wanted to." With that, he pulled the top off the bottle.

For just a second, nothing happened. Then a bit of blue smoke started to waft out the top, then there was a burst of blue and gold smoke and sparkles poured up through the top, arching over and to the floor, starting to form into a column shy of six feet tall. The smoke swirled about for a moment, then coalesced into a vaguely human form before the smoke faded out into the form of a young man, very slightly pudgy but still built fit, with long blonde hair and blue eyes, wearing an elaborate blue robe with gold trim and closed with a gold belt.

"Oh, I see," he said, a little bit snarkily. "You don't pull me out to help you when you're getting clawed into parts by a pissed-off weregirl, but you can tug me out of my bottle once everything's settled down and I'm enjoying some peace and quiet to help you settle a pointless argument with your stubborn father," he was saying even as his human form was still coming together.

"Greetings again, Jericho," Raven said plainly.

"Yeah, hi, Raven, what's up?" Chris rolled his eyes slightly. "Once again I'm calling your parenting skills into question, considering that your son relied on the sheer dumb luck to be rescued by benevolent demons rather than use a powerful one literally in arm's reach who can literally do anything with a full charge of magic and who's specifically spelled to obey his every order."

Johnny shrugged slightly. "I wasn't thinking right, Chris," he explained lamely. "I was just trying to survive, I was only focused on that. I...really just didn't want to call you..."

"Well, hello! I'm a Mammon, weren't you listening to the part where I'm pretty much able to do anything you need me to do with magic as long as I have my powers charged up, and they are, and I could heal you way better than some little incubus boy!"

"Yeah, but you know how much I hate those hunters who take a bottle demon and use it to kill other demons, don't do any of the work themselves. I hate that shit, it's completely against everything we're taught. I just want to try and do it on my own."

"Hey, I'll let you get mauled to pieces all you want while you're killing something, I have no problems with that. I get a little concerned when you hide in a kid's play shed and bleed on his coloring books rather than take two seconds to draw me out to mend that little mess!"

"All right, all right, I'm sorry..."

Chris rolled his eyes again, looking up at the ceiling. "They're both pretty freaked out up there. I think it'd be for the best if we gathered up our shit and went, Johnny, whether or not your dad is convinced of their niceness."

"But the weather-,"

"Yes, the ice, your car, your car, I get it, your car, the ice, blah blah blah blah _blah_, you need to just marry the damn car, now just tell me to spell something up to give you flawless snow tires, I'll force your father to swear never to come back here and slay these two, and we'll be on our way."

"You're not gonna force me to do anything," Raven growled.

"I'll force you to do something because it amuses me to know I can, regardless of whether or not I actually agree with your son's touchy-feely method of dealing with a pair of cubi. Though being a demon myself, I must admit I am slightly biased towards the New Order's methods rather than your shoot first, shoot later, shoot some more, shoot it till it's a smoking puddle of chunky salsa, and then pour holy water on the ashes methods."

Raven rolled his eyes. "We can discuss this later. We still have the Tulpa to be concerned about."

Johnny sighed. "It's good enough for now, Chris. You wanna go back in the bottle-?"

"Hell no. I need to stretch."

"Then magic on some less obvious clothes, go fix up the car's tires, and wait for me there, while I go thank Matt and Jeff for taking care of me, and then we'll all get our of their hair." Johnny nodded towards Raven. "Make sure he goes out with you."

Chris made a sort of half-assed wave of his hand, like a mocking genie gesture, and his robe seemed to instantaneously wink into a pair of black slacks, a silver dress shirt, and an open black jacket with black dress shoes, and he shooed Raven towards the door. "Out, pops, or I'll be forced to force you, and I'll get a great deal of pleasure from doing so."

"I never liked you," Raven muttered, as they made their way outside. "I couldn't wait for Johnny to be old enough to pass you on to..."

Johnny sighed, taking the cap of the blue bottle, which was no longer sparkling, and turning it upside-down to close it, putting it carefully back into his bag. He shuffled things around in it for a minute to put everything where he wanted it to be, then shrugged on his bag, looking up to see Matt already standing at the top of the stairs, and a hint of yellow behind him in the shadows showing that Jeff was peeking out as well.

"I think it's best if I go ahead and leave with my father," he said softly.

Matt tilted his head. "You don't have to protect us."

"I know I don't. But I don't want to impose, and you've already helped me more than I could repay. I really do appreciate it more than you can..." Johnny stopped, then scoffed in a sort of half-chuckle. "Well, maybe not more than _you_ can know."

Matt made his way down, Jeff behind him but glancing nervously towards the door. "It's all right. We're glad we could help. We...appreciate your...offer of friendliness." He hesitated a moment, then held out his hand.

Johnny smiled and took his hand, shaking it. "I'll keep my dad from coming back here. I promise you have nothing to worry about from either of us." He turned to Jeff, offering a hand to him as well, and after a moment of wide-eyed staring, Jeff reached out and grabbed Johnny's hand, but pulled away as quickly as he would pull away from a burning stovetop. Johnny nodded once and adjusted the straps of his pack again.

"Well...if you get injured here again...you're welcome here." Matt glanced at the door. "Not sure about him."

Johnny fully chuckled, turning to follow Chris and Raven outside. "Don't worry, no one I know is sure about Raven."


	7. Dinner at the Dysfunction Diner

Johnny settled into the the booth in the small diner, smirking faintly at Chris, who was sitting on the other side of the table, resting his chin in his hands, looking bored. "Turpas are normally a better fight than that," he said, as Johnny picked up the stained menu already sitting on the table and opened it.

"Tulpas. And usually it's one-on-one. Two hunters against one Tulpa is considerably less fair for them, especially two hunters with a Mammon at their disposal. Oh, they have pie! Awesome!"

Chris sighed, twirling a strand of hair around his finger, looking around. "Where'd Raven go?"

"In the bathroom, trying to wash the worst of the blood off."

"Huh." Chris shrugged faintly. "So what's next?"

"Lunch. Then I don't know. We look for the next hunt, I guess."

They were just outside Boston at the moment, having made their way from the cubis' home to the location of the demon they needed to kill. The battle, such as it was, went easily, just as Raven had figured when he'd called Johnny to come and help with the hunt. Tulpas, for all the badness they were capable of, had a rather difficult time focusing in more than one direction at a time, which made it easy to stab them in the back. Not the cleanest or most noble or honorable of kills, no, but demon hunting was war, and all was fair in war.

"I definitely want the pie," Johnny said, setting the menu down. "Maybe one of each flavor. It's hard to find good pie on the road."

"You know, if you didn't have me around, you wouldn't be able to eat all the pie you can get your hands on and keep those freakish abs," Chris said, a slightly bored tone to his voice.

"But that's why you're around, to make my life easier. Of course, the fact that I go more hand-to-hand than just about any other hunter of my generation has nothing to do with the shape I'm in."

Chris nodded a little, watching a waitress wander by, then shifted his attention back. "You know the cook is a ghost, right?"

"Is he happy?"

"Doesn't seem to even realize he's dead."

"We'll spend a day around here keeping an eye out to be sure things are kosher before we do anything. Then we'll act. Just don't tell Raven."

"Don't tell me what?" Raven asked, coming over, giving a sour look to Chris and gesturing, causing the blonde, with much eye rolling, to get up and move around to sit next to Johnny, so Raven could sit on the other side by himself, setting a tattered leather messenger bag in the seat beside him.

"You missed a spot," Johnny replied, gesturing slightly to Raven's face, ignoring the question.

Raven pulled a napkin from the dispenser and wiped at his face in roughly the correct spot. "You know, you have it completely backwards, Johnny. Most children refer to their parents by their names when they're angry at them, you only call me Dad when you're angry with me."

"We have a unique relationship. So where are you going after this?"

"I'm not sure yet. I haven't got any new leads on my next hunt. I probably need to get to the Academy soon and check in on your brother, though."

Johnny made a face. "He's not my brother."

"In the eyes of the Academy, he might as well be. Besides, what would you have me call him? That kid who got orphaned twice and wound up on our doorstep by order of the hierarchy and who I've been making guardianship decisions for for six years, and who gets your hand-me-downs and sleeps in your old room but who is not in a genetic or legal sense actually related to us?"

"If you have the breath to say it every time, sure. When was the last time you checked in on him anyway?"

"I don't know, a few months ago...the director called to say he was having trouble with that creepy Matthews boy so I had to go deal with that."

"A few months? For God's sakes Dad."

"See, that's how I can tell I've done something to annoy you, because suddenly I'm 'Dad.' At any rate, he's nearly 16 so he doesn't need me to-,"

Johnny sighed, and Chris, who had been simply listening in silence, spoke up. "He's actually already 17, Raven."

"Really? Well, that's even more to my point. He's growing up and he doesn't need me to look out for him every second."

A waitress finally approached the table, grinning widely. She was almost like a caricature of every small diner waitress that had ever been...a large beehive of dyed blonde hair, heavy blue eyeshadow, brilliant red lipstick, probably in her late forties, roughly 50 pounds overweight and wearing thin reading glasses. "Well, hello there, gentlemen," she said with a thick Southern accent, decidedly out of place considering their location. "What can I get for you?"

"I'll take a slice of every flavor of pie you have," Johnny said cheerfully, grinning widely. "And a glass of milk, whole, if you have it, please."

Chris scratched his nose slightly, then looked up. "I'll just have a chicken salad and a water."

"Cheeseburger, fries, and a Sprite, please," Raven said, nodding, scooting the menus off the table and out of the way. The waitress smiled warmly, apparently writing down the orders, and turned, heading through the stainless steel doors and into the kitchen.

"I think Chris and I will head south a little. It's close to the time of the year for the dryads to start getting active, so we might get reports of missing women that we can zone in on," Johnny said.

"Sounds reasonable." Raven sat back to allow the waitress to set down their food, raising an eyebrow slightly, but not saying anything until she'd made her way back towards the kitchen. "That was awfully fast."

"Just great service. Make sure to leave a good tip," Johnny said, grinning as he surveyed his plate of pie.

"Hmph." Raven picked up his burger, taking a bite, chewing thoughtfully for a moment, while Chris picked silently at his food and Johnny dug into the pie, making noises of pleasure as he wolfed down his meal. They ate in silence for a few minutes, before Raven spoke again. "So...what should we do about the cubi?"

"Why do we have to do anything about them?" Johnny asked.

"Johnny, like I said, there was a very good reason that such a strident effort to wipe them off the planet was made. Cubi are dangerous beasts, possibly one of the most dangerous types of demons there are, and definitely the biggest threat to human souls that exists."

"Matt and Jeff weren't like that," Johnny said, scowling slightly.

"You don't know that."

"No, and neither do you. You met Matt for all of half an hour, didn't even see Jeff, and think you can just pass your judgment on them just on that. It's like...it's racism, Dad, that's all it is. Just demon racism no different from the old days when there was skin color discrimination among humans."

"Except that it's very different, because unlike the beliefs about skin color, the truth of the matter is that demons are far and away always dangerous. Take Chris here...if he weren't tamed, a mammon would be violent, moody, and prone to doing things like raping and pillaging and scalping you if he decided he wanted your hairstyle."

"Like I'd want to be a brunette," Chris said mildly, taking another bite of his salad.

"Well, he is tamed, which according to you, shouldn't be possible because of how evil his kind are."

"He's a very, very rare, extraordinary exception. He's been in our family for six generations, nearly 200 years of captivity. Anything will grow to be at ease in a situation after 200 years of experiencing it."

"Well, the cubi weren't evil. They saved my life, and they made absolutely no motions of harm towards me. Hell, they were more afraid of me than I could have possibly been of them, they thought I was the big danger...and even despite that, they still brought me into their own home and healed me and fed me. And for that matter, even though you barreled into their turf and Matt flat said you could be a threat, they didn't attack you just because I asked them not to. They're restrained and they're careful and hell, they even arm themselves and are basically helping us do our job by killing werewolves out there. So far as any of us know, they're the last two of their kind, they just wanted to be left alone and live their lives in peace. They don't deserve to die for that."

Raven rolled his eyes slightly. "Now I know I need to go check on your brother because I left you on your own for too long and you got sucked into that damn New Order to the point of no return."

"I didn't get 'sucked in' to anything, Dad. I wanted to join, I sought them out to join them. I've seen too many demons who got killed and weren't doing anything wrong anywhere, just like the cubi. That German clan was a bunch of scholars and merchants who kept to themselves and had never had a single incident of violence."

"Never a single reported incident. Which could just as well be because when a cubi starts violence, the victim doesn't tend to live through it."

Johnny shook his head slightly, rubbing his temple, but turning his attention back to his pie. "We just need to realize we're two different generations and the way we do things is different. And you're going to have to accept that those two cubi haven't done anything wrong and if you try to do anything to hurt them, I'll never have anything to do with you ever again. I'm seriously putting my foot down on this, Dad."

"Of course you are." Raven polished off his burger, rolling his eyes some. "I'll leave them be for now, but I'll be keeping a close eye on the situation. If I even get a whiff of trouble, I'll report them to the Academy immediately."

"Fine. It's your turn to pay."

"I'm aware." Raven dug into his bag and pulled out a worn leather wallet, taking a couple of bills out and tossing them down on the table. "I'm heading back up the coast now to check your brother. He's probably still having all kinds of issues with his homework."

"That's what you get for enrolling someone who barely speaks English into the robotics division."

"Of course it is." Raven stood, patting one hand on Johnny's shoulder. "I'll be in touch."

"Sure thing. Number's the same as it always was. But Dad, take the tracker off my car before you go or I'll find you and set your hair on fire."

"Have Chris do it. I'm busy," Raven said brusquely, and with that, he turned on his heel, barely nodding to the waitress as he passed her, heading out the door and to his own car, gone.

"And another fascinating episode of the family dysfunction passes without either of you managing to completely overcome your constant emotional constipation," Chris said, getting up and scooting back to sit across the booth, reclaiming his old seat.

"Shut up. Raven and I get along just fine. It's just usually that we get along better if we're not within a hundred miles of each other."

"Well, at least he's not completely embarrassing like my father. And my uncle. And my sister. And everyone in my family but my mother, actually. Actually, yeah, you're right, Raven's not so completely unacceptable as a father figure. Just distant and hollow, like you."

"Like all hunters," Johnny said, starting on his last slice of pie. "It's the nature of the job. I mean, you're like the only friend I have, I can't stand most of the other hunters, not even the ones I'm joined up with."

"Speaking of total abandonment of your family, when was the last time _you_ checked in with _them_, Raven Jr.?"

"Shut up and take the tracker off my car so we can go. I want to find a hotel around here so I can at least have a decent night's sleep while we're watching this ghost."

"Excellent deflection, yet again," Chris smirked, but he gestured faintly, rolling his eyes a little. "Okay, it's done."

"Good. Okay, let's gather up and get moving. But first, I'm going to order more pie to go. This is some good shit."

Chris rolled his eyes yet again. "Whatever makes you happy."


	8. Unhappy Coincidence

Author note: Don't get me wrong from reading this, I like Lita a lot, she's one of my favorite Divas of all time. But I'm using her as a villain for now so I'm using her heel persona. Besides, if you look up pixies on Wikipedia, it actually does say that they have issues with wearing enough clothes ;)

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Johnny was straddling a thick tree branch nearby the diner, leaned back against the truck, holding a pair of binoculars to his eyes as he watched through the kitchen window. A little asking of Jericho and he had gotten this ideal perch from which to observe the ghost chef, moving back and forth and somehow managing to manipulate appliances and food into familiar dishes. Johnny himself was snacking on a wrap he'd bought that morning, after spending the night in a nearby cheap motel, but by now it was almost noon and he was debating going inside for lunch.

"I'm so _bored_!" a voice came from above him, and Johnny glanced up at Jericho, dressed in ordinary jeans and a T-shirt, hanging upside-down from a branch several feet up, his blonde hair blowing back and forth around his face as swung back and forth. "Oh my God, it's so obvious nothing is going on here, can't we go now?"

"You can always go back in your bottle if you want."

"Ugh. I'm bored in there too. You can only read so many books."

"Can't you get a TV or something like that?"

"No. Because I'm _bored_. Also, do you have any idea about the schematics of trying to hook cable or a satellite into a bottle? It ain't happening."

Johnny sighed slightly. Chris was a Mammon, a species of demon that some Academy scholars believed was the result of ancient genies and fairies getting along...well, quite well, to turn a phrase. Like genies, their magic was limited only by their capacity to contain it-and the phase of the moon, to a degree-and Chris was one of the highest-ranked bottle Mammons of the Academy. However, they were also like their fae brethren-notoriously flighty, tended towards general weird behavior, and were out for the pleasure of the moment beyond most anything else. The closest way Johnny had ever had it explained to him was comparing it to human A.D.D. Normally, Chris was well-behaved and plenty able to keep himself amused, but he wasn't immune to behaving like his species. Today was obviously not going to be one of the better days.

"Are you sure you don't want to go back in the bottle?" Johnny asked, taking the binoculars and hanging them around his neck, moving to start climbing back down the tree.

"I want to go to the mall," Chris responded, following him down a little more recklessly, more or less jumping from branch to branch.

"I don't think there's a mall around here to go to," Johnny replied, shaking his head as he jumped the last five feet to the ground, picking up his pack that had been resting at the base of the tree.

Chris leapt down from wherever he had made it to, but stopped falling shy of the ground, hovering just a second before letting his feet light. "Well, we need to go do something fun. We've been on the road nonstop for a solid month now, and you need to go somewhere and unwind before you completely fall apart. Everyone needs to recharge their batteries once in a while, even hunters."

"Look, let's just pop into the diner, grab a bite for lunch, and then we'll head out. We can find a Wal-Mart or something. I need to restock on first aid stuff anyway."

Chris blew a raspberry, shaking his head. "That's not even close to what I meant." He glanced back towards the small building. "So we're leaving him in there?"

"He's happy, he's not doing anything untoward, and none of the people working there are in distress. Either they don't know or don't care...either way, I'm not inclined to do anything about it. He obviously had a good life here and he wants to stay a while longer. We'll go talk to a few of the people there and check up on his story, but beyond that, I don't feel inclined to do much."

Chris shrugged faintly, apparently as equally unconcerned with the ghost cook as he was concerned with finding something to do. "Not to mention you ate all that pie and didn't even get a stomachache."

Johnny smirked faintly at the memory as they headed over to the car and loaded in their equipment, Chris all but bouncing into the passenger seat. "I can't help it if the ghost knows how to make a good pie crust," Johnny replied, getting into the driver's side and cranking the engine, heading back towards the diner.

"You probably ate ectoplasm."

"I chased it with holy water so I'll be fine even if I did. Speaking of which, we need to track down a Protestant church and get some more of that soon."

"What about the Catholic supply?"

"Still got three bottles in the back, that's enough for a few more weeks."

Chris made a face and waved a hand in a sort of "whatever" gesture, leaning back in his seat as they pulled into the parking lot of the diner. However, he perked up immediately at the sight of a somewhat dingy station wagon that was in the parking lot, tilting his head faintly. "Doesn't that car belong to that dirty kid you used to fight with all the time?"

"Dirty kid?" Johnny blinked but looked over as he pulled his car into a spot and parked it, killing the engine. "You mean Phil Brooks from the class ahead of me?"

"Yeah, that one, that stinky son of a bitch who calls himself Punk."

"Punk's turf is in Chicago, he wouldn't be at a greasy spoon in the middle of Massachusetts," Johnny said, shaking his head and climbing out of the car, heading for the door of the diner.

"And you spent seven months trying to carve out a claim in California, but here we are." Chris followed right on Johnny's heels, scowling a little as they passed the station wagon. "God, even his car is filthy."

"Punk wasn't dirty, he just...looked a little funny."

"He did smell bad though, you can't deny that."

Johnny shook his head as he pushed open the door to the diner and stepped inside, then froze, blinking at the sight of his former schoolmate, sitting in a booth despite every reason for him not to be, with a sparsely dressed redhead curled up against his side, apparently a doting lover of sorts. "Huh," was the only comment he could offer.

"Oh God and he has his pet pixie with him, too," Chris said, wrinkling his nose in apparent disgust. "Don't go over there, you'll get sucked into the irrevocable bonds of slutdom."

Johnny shook his head, but beelined straight for the booth, hand briefly touching the spot on his belt where he would normally have a knife. "What in God's name are you doing here?" he asked, sensing Chris reluctantly staying close to him.

Phil Brooks, going by the hunting name of Punk, looked up at him, and smiled a somewhat lopsided smirk, even as the redhead regarded the two newcomers coolly. "Well, holy hell, look at who it is, Lita. My old bruisin' buddy, Nitro. And he even has his pretty demon out of the damn glass for once."

"Fuck you, Punk," Chris said nonchalantly.

"You only wish you could, Mammon," the redhead, Lita, purred, resting her head on Punk's shoulder and mimicking his smirk.

"Hardly. Lord knows what sort of exotic diseases are breeding in that manwhore's system-he probably has every venereal disease a human can pick up and some that only afflict satyrs and vampires."

"Oh please, you're just jealous because your owner doesn't even let you out of the bottle more than a couple times a month, let alone do anything else with you," she shot back, leaning slightly over Punk to get more in Chris's face.

"And you're just jealous I can shapeshift because my face doesn't look like I grew up smashed into the corner of a wall!"

"Yeah, right, your real face probably really looks like the three faces of Cerebus all smashed into one!"

"Yeah, look, this is fun and all," Johnny interrupted, reaching out to grip Chris's arm and pull him back, as the two demons were already baring their teeth at each other. He sighed, then looked down at Punk. "What are you doing here? Don't you usually hang around the middle of the country?"

"Usually, yes, but I promised Lita we'd take a trip down the coast, so we're working on that now," Punk replied, the same smug look on his face.

Chris started making vaguely rude noises, but Johnny silenced him with a wave of his hand. "A trip down the coast in the middle of winter? You'd want to hit the west one at this time of year. Right now everything is wet and icy and disgusting."

"Maybe I like it cold and wet," Lita snickered.

"That would explain why you're with him," Chris muttered.

"I'm with him because he earned the right to keep my company," Lita snarled. "I'm just as strong as you are, you puffy bitch."

"Yeah, but odor isn't everything."

Johnny smacked a hand to his forehead, then grabbed Chris's arm again. "Well, nice to see you again, Phil, have fun on your trip," he muttered, turning and heading for the door of the diner, pulling the blonde behind him even as Punk and Lita watched them go.

"Why are we leaving? I'm not done insulting that stupid pixie yet."

"I know you two don't get along but the last thing we need is you and her getting into a huge demon catfight and whipping out powers and breaking our cover. We don't want a bunch of people flying into a panic."

Chris growled, but as soon as they were outside, he pulled to a stop, shaking his head. "Wait, this is not what it looks like."

"What do you mean?" Johnny asked, turning to look back at him.

"I can buy that Lita would whore her way into getting her owner to take her on a trip instead of doing their job. And that for some crazy reason they would want to come to the East Coast in the middle of winter. But what are the odds of them showing up at the same diner that we've been scoping out for the last couple of days?"

"What do you think it means?"

Chris glanced back at the door. "We knew the cook was a ghost within thirty minutes of being here. The only reason Raven didn't find out was because I was keeping it from his mind. Punk might be on a vacation, but as soon as Lita detected a ghost, she'd have guided him straight to it. He has to know. And he's not New Order."

"Ah, shit." Johnny shook his head, turning and heading back inside, heading for the table, moving to slide in across from Punk and Lita.

"What, decided you couldn't stand another minute outside the pleasure of our company?" Punk asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Leave the cook alone, Punk. He's not hurting anyone."

"How do you know? He's a ghost, Johnny, and for all we know he's poisoning people."

"Because I've been scoping this place for hours now and nothing's happened. I've eaten the food myself, Chris has too. It's just a ghost who wants to stay on this side a little while longer because he enjoyed his life here."

"Ghosts degrade, Johnny, you know that as well as I do."

"I know they do, and that is a problem with the angry ghosts, but this one's not. He's just a guy and he's harmless. You need to leave him alone and move on."

"Or what are you gonna do about it if I don't?" Punk asked, narrowing his eyes slightly. Before Johnny could answer, Lita abruptly reached over, putting a hand on Punk's shoulder and whispering into his ear. Punk blinked, glancing at her, and she nodded, and a slow smirk spread across Punk's face. "Oh really?"

"Yup." Lita glanced back at Johnny, grinning widely. "Funny enough, they aren't as extinct as you'd think."

Johnny blinked a second, then bared his teeth in a fierce snarl. "Stop scanning my mind, you fucking bitch!"

"It's not my fault you think so loudly."

"Two cubi in America, huh?" Punk said, grinning a little wider. "Man, the Academy board guys are gonna shit their collective pants when they find out."


End file.
